Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five is about Billy Pilgrim’s quest throughout his life. Although his quest occurs due to the unintentional time-shifting, the real reason of the quest is the self-knowledge.
In Slaughterhouse-Five, Billy Pilgrim goes to the past, present and future of his life, thus creating three main plots: his experience in World War II as a young man, his experience in Tralfamadore, an alien’s planet, as a middle-aged man, and his life in the society as an old man. This is possible only because “Billy Pilgrim has come unstruck in time. Billy has gone to sleep a senile widower and awakened on his wedding day. He has walked through a door in 1955 and come out another one in 1941.”(Vonnegut 23). Although Billy’s times traveling allows him to move to different time, it is also an obstacle that interferes and irritates his life.
Although Billy doesn’t realize it, he finally ends his quest for self-knowledge in Tralfamadore. Tralfamadorians say that humans have such a narrow sight that Tralfamadorians cannot even understand. And that is how Billy realizes that he has to change his point of view; Instead of thinking in a three dimensional form, he starts to think and behave in a state of four dimensions and actually applies it in his real life. For example, he reassures people’s death by saying that they are still alive in their past memory, thus there is no need to cry for death.
It is interesting that even when his quest was successful, Billy didn’t live a successful life. People around him consider Billy as a mentally-disordered patient without any reputation. As a result, Vonnegut wants to emphasize the importance of choosing the right quest and setting the right purpose in our life. If we start with a wrong goal, like Billy, even when we achieve our goal, it wouldn’t be worth it. But by choosing the right quest, we can finally get what we really wanted.
Essay #2 - Violence
Violence only occurs when one has more than others, such as money, power, or even knowledge. Kart Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five, is no exception from this perspective. In this novel, violence also symbolizes one’s superiority over others, which is derived from a perspective that one has what other does not.
During World War II, a U.S. soldier, Billy Pilgrim is left behind in the middle of Germany. In order to survive, he follows Ronald Weary, a gun crew ho likes to show off, with two other scouts. Weary always likes to show, explain and ask stuff that Billy doesn’t know and feels pleasure by reassuring himself that he is better than Billy. To Weary, Billy is nothing more than a “damn college kid” who will witness his heroic deeds that “saved his God-damned hide for him.”(Vonnegut 48). When that Billy destroys Weary’s fighting organization, Weary lets go of his wrath and uses violence on Billy. Weary just couldn’t bear the fact that the inferior Billy, who has neither strength nor knowledge as Weary himself, marred his own dignity.
Another violence occurs while Billy was staying at the hospital. Paul Lizzaro, another American prisoner, is carried into the hospital as a new patient. He got caught while stealing cigarettes from the British. The Englishman broke Lazzaro’s arm and punched him unconscious and made fun of Americans as “Weak, smelly, self-pitying-a pack of sniveling, dirty, thieving bastards… worse than the bleeding Russians.”(Vonnegut 127). He naturally puts Englishmen above and the Americans beneath them. Thus the violence that he showed comes from the pride that his nation is stronger.
Slaughterhouse-Five not only emphasizes that violence is used as a symbol of superiority but also that it solves nothing. If Weary hadn’t used violence to Billy, he would have heard the sound of the dog barking and would have probably ran away from German soldiers and saved his life. Also as the Englishmen used violence on Lizzaro, he had to be quite embarrassed to take care of Lizzaro and stay up all day. As a result, Vonnegut goes against violence, and to the extend, war.
Essay #3 - Symbol
Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five is full of symbols. One of those symbols, the most noticeable one is the comparison of the sight of fourth-dimension, which symbolizes the ideal life and sight of third-dimension, which symbolizes real life.
Billy Pilgrim is kidnapped by Tralfamadorians and becomes a specimen in their zoo. In Tralfamadore, the Tralfamadorians and Billy learn about each other. As they are alien to each other, there are many aspects that they couldn’t understand. Among those, one thing that Billy couldn’t easily understand was Tralfamadorian’s view through fourth dimension.
Through the fourth dimension, Tralfamadorians can not only see through an object, but also through time. Unlike human being, who can only acknowledge and see the present, Tralfamadore can see throughout the past, present, and future. For human beings, death means the end. There is nothing beyond the death. For Tralfamadorians, however, “There is no beginning, no middle, no end…”(Vonnegut 88). When one of a Tralfamadorian dies, the other one never cries, as the dead one is still alive in the past.
As a result, by using the characteristic of the fourth dimension, Tralfamadorians can “ignore the awful times, and concentrate on the good ones.”(Vonnegut 117). Although this seems really attractive to Billy who suffers from various obstacles, this only remains in the fourth dimension as idealistic. And humans, who can only live in and recognize in three dimensions, have to see what’s in the third dimension, the reality.
Setting one’s mind on an ideal state, like the Tralfamadorian’s fourth dimension sight, can encourage one to achieve better results. However, only adhering to the ideal state cannot really change what’s in the reality. In order to actually improve, one needs to confront ones reality, rather it is completely failure or extremely fragile. And that’s how humans improved so rapidly in their three dimensioned world.
Essay #4 - Blindness
“His head was encased in a steel sphere which he could never take off. There was only one eyehole through which he could look, and welded to that eyehole were six feet of pipe.”(Vonnegut 115). In Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five, humans are described as near-blind in that they cannot see the entirety.
One day, Billy Pilgrim, a normal middle-aged optomitrist, is captured by aliens called Tralfamadorians. They take Billy Pilgrim to their planet Tralfamadore as a specimen in zoo. Many Tralfamadorians visit his cage and observe his behaviors, ask him questions, and listen to his answers. While Billy is at the zoo, he learns and tells many new things; one of those is the Tralfamadorian’s ability to see in four dimensions.
For example, a Tralfamadorian can see what is in the mug, under the mug, beyond the mug and even through the table, using sight of fourth dimension, but all a human can see is one fourth of the mug. There might be a coffee inside the mug, a ball under the table, and spoon next to the mug. But all human can do is observing one at a time. First, the mug, then the coffee, spoon, table, and finally a ball. Thus the view of third dimension is a metaphor at the same time to criticize human’s narrow point of view.
Interestingly, Vonnegut ends last sentence of the section with “That’s life.”(Vonnegut 115). This means that as long as we are humans and only can see through third dimension, we can’t take off our sphere helmets. So instead of only complaining about our narrowness, Vonnegut might want to warn that by trying our best for each subject that we see through the narrowness, we can get the better quality of result.
As a conclusion, our view that is too narrow that it makes us nearly as blind, has to be carefully dealt with. And in some point, this narrowness can raise our concentration and reach positive results.
Essay #5 - Baptism
Imagine that the Mississippi river is in front of you. Count to three. One, two, Three… What is in front of you is still flowing without any difference. However, would the water you are staring at right now be the same as what you were staring at three seconds ago? Water flows and cleans up what is next to it. The concept of Baptism is derived from the idea above. By getting soaked, humans abandon their old shape and are reborn as new people. In Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five, Billy also lives a completely new life after getting soaked in water.
Billy Pilgrim can unintentionally time-shift. When he was young, he joined the World War II as US soldier but was captured by the Germans. While Billy was being transported to Dresden, all US prisoners were forced to take a shower. While Billy was taking a shower, he goes unconscious. And usually when Billy becomes unconscious, he time-shifts. So he does. He shifts to the time when he is captured by aliens, the Tralfamadorians, which can see in four dimensions.
While Billy is in Tralfamadore, he learns that Tralfamadorians can “ignore the awful times, and concentrate on the good ones.”(Vonnegut 117). For example, while humans can only see the present, thus cry when others pass away, Tralfamadorians can also see the past, thus smile, recollecting the time when the being was alive. When confronted a mountain, Tralfamadorians see what’s in front, next to, beyond, and inside the mountain. However, all humans can see is the mountain itself. So after Billy learns Tralfamadorian’s sight, he becomes a new person.
It is significant that Billy time-shifted to the Tralfamadore planet, while he was taking a shower. And what Billy learns from the planet changes him. Thus, the shower changes Billy’s life. Although, a capable optometrist, people diagnosed Billy as mentally ill. However, Billy became a man with wider sight, no longer a dummy who can only see a partially.
Comments
Hi Eunice! We read the same book and wrote similiar essays! I just thought I would comment on the one that I never thought about when I was doing my assignment. Yeah, I never thought that learning the knowledge from the Trafamadorians would be as significant as recreating a new Billy Pilgrim. Honestly, I probably just disregarded the fact that Billy became a new person after the washing and printing of his number. Anyways, enough about what I did. I really like the idea you gave which I said before. But one thing your essay lacks slightly is the analysis. The analysis of the Trafamadorians' view and different dimensional perception sounds more like a summary than an analysis. Other than that, there was no problem grammatically and the sentence flow. And I really like how you described the Mississippi river as though it really is in front of the reader. It really drew me into what you were going to say next.
Sally Park
Comments
1. Select and read two of your peers' essays.
2. Underneath each essay, thoughtfully comment on the ideas put forth.
3. This comment should be no more than one succinct paragraph.
4. Post and label the comment on the writer's page with your name at the bottom of your comment.
5. Copy and paste the comment onto your summer reading page in the comments section.
6. Write the writer's name and essay # underneath the comments on your own page.
Comment #1 -Sally's second Essay(Violence) Wow! We chose the same book for the assignment! Anyway, you did a great job explaining this novel through the lenses of Foster’s book. You clearly and specifically explain how you connect Lozzaro’s violence with what’s in Foster’s book. Also it is really interesting how you connect this violence with the Greek myth about Scylla. But I feel like you didn’t analyze your quote deeply enough. Although the quote matches really well with your theme, without any more analyzes of the quote, your quote doesn’t explain everything what it can mean. Lastly when you site your page number, there is no comma between the page number and the author. So it has to be something like, (Vonnegut 115). Except for these, I think you did a great job explaining Slaughterhouse-Five through the lenses of How to Read Literature Like a Professor!! Oh! And don’t forget to underline the title!!!
Comment #2 - Sally's fifth Essay (Blindness)
Sally Hi~ You did a great job connecting your idea with Thomas C. Foster’s book. When I was writing this section, I only thought about Tralfamadorians’ four dimensional sights. So it is really amazing how you connect this idea to his job and people in Dresden. But I think it would have been better if you analyze more about the book itself and the quote in the second body paragraph. And in the introduction, I think you mistyped this part. -> “…theme of Slaughterhouse-Five. Kurt Vonnegut.”. Also watch out the citation! There is no comma between author and page number. Lastly, don’t forget to underline the title. Except for this I really love your essay! It has so many new ideas that I didn’t even think about!! Great JOB!!
Slaughterhouse-FiveBy Kurt Vonnegut
Essay #1 - Quest
Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five is about Billy Pilgrim’s quest throughout his life. Although his quest occurs due to the unintentional time-shifting, the real reason of the quest is the self-knowledge.
In Slaughterhouse-Five, Billy Pilgrim goes to the past, present and future of his life, thus creating three main plots: his experience in World War II as a young man, his experience in Tralfamadore, an alien’s planet, as a middle-aged man, and his life in the society as an old man. This is possible only because “Billy Pilgrim has come unstruck in time. Billy has gone to sleep a senile widower and awakened on his wedding day. He has walked through a door in 1955 and come out another one in 1941.”(Vonnegut 23). Although Billy’s times traveling allows him to move to different time, it is also an obstacle that interferes and irritates his life.
Although Billy doesn’t realize it, he finally ends his quest for self-knowledge in Tralfamadore. Tralfamadorians say that humans have such a narrow sight that Tralfamadorians cannot even understand. And that is how Billy realizes that he has to change his point of view; Instead of thinking in a three dimensional form, he starts to think and behave in a state of four dimensions and actually applies it in his real life. For example, he reassures people’s death by saying that they are still alive in their past memory, thus there is no need to cry for death.
It is interesting that even when his quest was successful, Billy didn’t live a successful life. People around him consider Billy as a mentally-disordered patient without any reputation. As a result, Vonnegut wants to emphasize the importance of choosing the right quest and setting the right purpose in our life. If we start with a wrong goal, like Billy, even when we achieve our goal, it wouldn’t be worth it. But by choosing the right quest, we can finally get what we really wanted.
Essay #2 - Violence
Violence only occurs when one has more than others, such as money, power, or even knowledge. Kart Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five, is no exception from this perspective. In this novel, violence also symbolizes one’s superiority over others, which is derived from a perspective that one has what other does not.
During World War II, a U.S. soldier, Billy Pilgrim is left behind in the middle of Germany. In order to survive, he follows Ronald Weary, a gun crew ho likes to show off, with two other scouts. Weary always likes to show, explain and ask stuff that Billy doesn’t know and feels pleasure by reassuring himself that he is better than Billy. To Weary, Billy is nothing more than a “damn college kid” who will witness his heroic deeds that “saved his God-damned hide for him.”(Vonnegut 48). When that Billy destroys Weary’s fighting organization, Weary lets go of his wrath and uses violence on Billy. Weary just couldn’t bear the fact that the inferior Billy, who has neither strength nor knowledge as Weary himself, marred his own dignity.
Another violence occurs while Billy was staying at the hospital. Paul Lizzaro, another American prisoner, is carried into the hospital as a new patient. He got caught while stealing cigarettes from the British. The Englishman broke Lazzaro’s arm and punched him unconscious and made fun of Americans as “Weak, smelly, self-pitying-a pack of sniveling, dirty, thieving bastards… worse than the bleeding Russians.”(Vonnegut 127). He naturally puts Englishmen above and the Americans beneath them. Thus the violence that he showed comes from the pride that his nation is stronger.
Slaughterhouse-Five not only emphasizes that violence is used as a symbol of superiority but also that it solves nothing. If Weary hadn’t used violence to Billy, he would have heard the sound of the dog barking and would have probably ran away from German soldiers and saved his life. Also as the Englishmen used violence on Lizzaro, he had to be quite embarrassed to take care of Lizzaro and stay up all day. As a result, Vonnegut goes against violence, and to the extend, war.
Essay #3 - Symbol
Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five is full of symbols. One of those symbols, the most noticeable one is the comparison of the sight of fourth-dimension, which symbolizes the ideal life and sight of third-dimension, which symbolizes real life.
Billy Pilgrim is kidnapped by Tralfamadorians and becomes a specimen in their zoo. In Tralfamadore, the Tralfamadorians and Billy learn about each other. As they are alien to each other, there are many aspects that they couldn’t understand. Among those, one thing that Billy couldn’t easily understand was Tralfamadorian’s view through fourth dimension.
Through the fourth dimension, Tralfamadorians can not only see through an object, but also through time. Unlike human being, who can only acknowledge and see the present, Tralfamadore can see throughout the past, present, and future. For human beings, death means the end. There is nothing beyond the death. For Tralfamadorians, however, “There is no beginning, no middle, no end…”(Vonnegut 88). When one of a Tralfamadorian dies, the other one never cries, as the dead one is still alive in the past.
As a result, by using the characteristic of the fourth dimension, Tralfamadorians can “ignore the awful times, and concentrate on the good ones.”(Vonnegut 117). Although this seems really attractive to Billy who suffers from various obstacles, this only remains in the fourth dimension as idealistic. And humans, who can only live in and recognize in three dimensions, have to see what’s in the third dimension, the reality.
Setting one’s mind on an ideal state, like the Tralfamadorian’s fourth dimension sight, can encourage one to achieve better results. However, only adhering to the ideal state cannot really change what’s in the reality. In order to actually improve, one needs to confront ones reality, rather it is completely failure or extremely fragile. And that’s how humans improved so rapidly in their three dimensioned world.
Essay #4 - Blindness
“His head was encased in a steel sphere which he could never take off. There was only one eyehole through which he could look, and welded to that eyehole were six feet of pipe.”(Vonnegut 115). In Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five, humans are described as near-blind in that they cannot see the entirety.
One day, Billy Pilgrim, a normal middle-aged optomitrist, is captured by aliens called Tralfamadorians. They take Billy Pilgrim to their planet Tralfamadore as a specimen in zoo. Many Tralfamadorians visit his cage and observe his behaviors, ask him questions, and listen to his answers. While Billy is at the zoo, he learns and tells many new things; one of those is the Tralfamadorian’s ability to see in four dimensions.
For example, a Tralfamadorian can see what is in the mug, under the mug, beyond the mug and even through the table, using sight of fourth dimension, but all a human can see is one fourth of the mug. There might be a coffee inside the mug, a ball under the table, and spoon next to the mug. But all human can do is observing one at a time. First, the mug, then the coffee, spoon, table, and finally a ball. Thus the view of third dimension is a metaphor at the same time to criticize human’s narrow point of view.
Interestingly, Vonnegut ends last sentence of the section with “That’s life.”(Vonnegut 115). This means that as long as we are humans and only can see through third dimension, we can’t take off our sphere helmets. So instead of only complaining about our narrowness, Vonnegut might want to warn that by trying our best for each subject that we see through the narrowness, we can get the better quality of result.
As a conclusion, our view that is too narrow that it makes us nearly as blind, has to be carefully dealt with. And in some point, this narrowness can raise our concentration and reach positive results.
Essay #5 - Baptism
Imagine that the Mississippi river is in front of you. Count to three. One, two, Three… What is in front of you is still flowing without any difference. However, would the water you are staring at right now be the same as what you were staring at three seconds ago? Water flows and cleans up what is next to it. The concept of Baptism is derived from the idea above. By getting soaked, humans abandon their old shape and are reborn as new people. In Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five, Billy also lives a completely new life after getting soaked in water.
Billy Pilgrim can unintentionally time-shift. When he was young, he joined the World War II as US soldier but was captured by the Germans. While Billy was being transported to Dresden, all US prisoners were forced to take a shower. While Billy was taking a shower, he goes unconscious. And usually when Billy becomes unconscious, he time-shifts. So he does. He shifts to the time when he is captured by aliens, the Tralfamadorians, which can see in four dimensions.
While Billy is in Tralfamadore, he learns that Tralfamadorians can “ignore the awful times, and concentrate on the good ones.”(Vonnegut 117). For example, while humans can only see the present, thus cry when others pass away, Tralfamadorians can also see the past, thus smile, recollecting the time when the being was alive. When confronted a mountain, Tralfamadorians see what’s in front, next to, beyond, and inside the mountain. However, all humans can see is the mountain itself. So after Billy learns Tralfamadorian’s sight, he becomes a new person.
It is significant that Billy time-shifted to the Tralfamadore planet, while he was taking a shower. And what Billy learns from the planet changes him. Thus, the shower changes Billy’s life. Although, a capable optometrist, people diagnosed Billy as mentally ill. However, Billy became a man with wider sight, no longer a dummy who can only see a partially.
Comments
Hi Eunice! We read the same book and wrote similiar essays! I just thought I would comment on the one that I never thought about when I was doing my assignment. Yeah, I never thought that learning the knowledge from the Trafamadorians would be as significant as recreating a new Billy Pilgrim. Honestly, I probably just disregarded the fact that Billy became a new person after the washing and printing of his number. Anyways, enough about what I did. I really like the idea you gave which I said before. But one thing your essay lacks slightly is the analysis. The analysis of the Trafamadorians' view and different dimensional perception sounds more like a summary than an analysis. Other than that, there was no problem grammatically and the sentence flow. And I really like how you described the Mississippi river as though it really is in front of the reader. It really drew me into what you were going to say next.
Sally Park
Comments
1. Select and read two of your peers' essays.
2. Underneath each essay, thoughtfully comment on the ideas put forth.
3. This comment should be no more than one succinct paragraph.
4. Post and label the comment on the writer's page with your name at the bottom of your comment.
5. Copy and paste the comment onto your summer reading page in the comments section.
6. Write the writer's name and essay # underneath the comments on your own page.
Comment #1 - Sally's second Essay(Violence)
Wow! We chose the same book for the assignment! Anyway, you did a great job explaining this novel through the lenses of Foster’s book. You clearly and specifically explain how you connect Lozzaro’s violence with what’s in Foster’s book. Also it is really interesting how you connect this violence with the Greek myth about Scylla. But I feel like you didn’t analyze your quote deeply enough. Although the quote matches really well with your theme, without any more analyzes of the quote, your quote doesn’t explain everything what it can mean. Lastly when you site your page number, there is no comma between the page number and the author. So it has to be something like, (Vonnegut 115). Except for these, I think you did a great job explaining Slaughterhouse-Five through the lenses of How to Read Literature Like a Professor!! Oh! And don’t forget to underline the title!!!
Comment #2 - Sally's fifth Essay (Blindness)
Sally Hi~ You did a great job connecting your idea with Thomas C. Foster’s book. When I was writing this section, I only thought about Tralfamadorians’ four dimensional sights. So it is really amazing how you connect this idea to his job and people in Dresden. But I think it would have been better if you analyze more about the book itself and the quote in the second body paragraph. And in the introduction, I think you mistyped this part. -> “…theme of Slaughterhouse-Five. Kurt Vonnegut.”. Also watch out the citation! There is no comma between author and page number. Lastly, don’t forget to underline the title. Except for this I really love your essay! It has so many new ideas that I didn’t even think about!! Great JOB!!